New Harvest market opens

Mike DonilaOur Town Outdoors

The New Harvest Park Farmers’ Market kicked off Thursday with 15 vendors, and Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs ringing the bell to get the festivities underway.

The market is open 3-6 p.m. every Thursday through the middle of September. As the months get warmer, more and more vendors will participate, and we also plan to host several bigger events in the summer.

Earlier this week, we closed two playgrounds, one at Maloney Road Park and the other at French Memorial Park. The reason? We’re resurfacing them with a rubberized surface and removing the mulch that we have in there now. The rubber surfaces are safer and less expensive to maintain over the long haul. Plus, they look nicer!

We try to do a couple each year. We’ve recently resurfaced playgrounds at The Cove, John Tarleton Park and Clayton Park. Also, newer parks like the I.C. King extension and Plumb Creek Park received them when they were initially built.

The playgrounds at Maloney Road and French Memorial will more than likely be closed for at least three to four weeks. As our crews began removing the mulch and taking down the equipment, our contractor learned that some of the materials were recently placed on backorder. We apologize for the inconvenience, but they’ll be back up and running soon!

Also, a big shout out to Knoxville Ball Hockey, the latest organization to join our Adopt-A-Park program. KBH adopted the skatepark and hockey rink at Concord Park. For more information about the program, check out the Knox County Parks and Recreation Department’s webpage.

Other than that, it’s been somewhat of a slow week.

“We’ve got a lot of crews mowing and doing,” said Jason Halliburton, the department’s superintendent of maintenance. “Nothing huge this week but our guys are out there doing the little things and that counts. We’ve got guys in Beaver Creek every day working on the Knox County Water Trail and our electrician has been chasing light issues here, there and everywhere.”

Halliburton said crews also had to fix the gates to the dog park at Plumb Creek Park and put a new coat of paint on the rails throughout the Concord Park system.

The Knox County Engineering and Public Works Department also has been hard at work.

Here’s just a snapshot of some of what they’ve done this past week:

  • W.Emory – Localized roadway resurfacing repair
  • Moshina – Installation of roadway apron at intersection
  • Chrysler – Installation of drainage swale

Enjoy this photo carousel of projects across the county:

Mike Donila is communications director for Knox County government

 

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